Make time for quiet and reflection to support effective action: stay engaged and maintain situational awareness but take stock periodically.
Quiet and Reflection Support Effective Action
“Great chess players are like two people in one — the person playing and the person analyzing the person playing. They develop the discipline of asking themselves a series of questions not just after every game but after every move.”
Bruce Grierson (@BruceGrierson) in “The Best Habit of All: Self-Correction“
This is also a useful method for improving your negotiation skills, interviewing skills, and ability to collaborate effectively . Because it’s very hard to be both “in the moment” thinking hard and observing yourself a “workout buddy” or partner can observe aspects of a situation that you may overlook.
You can alternate between being fully engaged and brief reflection. Viktor Frankl observed, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” Cultivating mindfulness requires you to maintain situational awareness and realize when your reflexes may trigger a reaction that is not as thoughtful as the situation requires.
Sometimes, you need more than a brief period of reflection to be able to understand your situation and arrive at an effective plan. You may need to consider multiple possibilities and craft experiments. Forming and managing business hypotheses is a skill that distinguishes experienced entrepreneurs from novices. The experienced entrepreneur often knows where to look; the novice may see a bewildering array of possibilities but can sometimes select a novel approach overlooked by the expert because experience has biased him away from it.
I Shall Not Rush, But Stop and Rest For Quiet Intervals
Psalm 23 for Busy People
The Lord is my pace-setter, I shall not rush;
he makes me stop and rest for quiet intervals,
he provides me with images of stillness,
which restore my serenity.
He leads me in the way of efficiency,
through calmness of mind,
and his guidance is peace.
Even though I have a great many things
to accomplish each day,
I will not fret, for his presence is here.
His timelessness, his all-importance
will keep me in balance.He prepares refreshment and renewal
in the midst of activity,
by anointing my mind with his oils of tranquility
my cup of joyous energy overflows.
Surely harmony and effectiveness shall be
the fruits of my hours
and I shall walk in the pace of my Lord,
and dwell in his house for ever.
Toki Miyashina in “Bless The Day” by June Cotner
h/t Sheridan Voysey and Tony Miles (also in “Maybe Tomorrow” by Tony Miles and “Psalm 23: an Anthology” by Kathleen Strange)